Numbers That Stay With the File
The page counter in a PDF reader is part of the reader, not the document. Print the file, email it, or open it somewhere else and the numbers are gone, which becomes a problem the moment a printed copy is passed around a meeting and nobody can say which page they are looking at.
This tool draws the numbers onto the pages themselves. Once saved they are part of the content: they print, they survive being merged into a larger document, and they appear the same in every viewer on every device.
How to Add Page Numbers to a PDF
Everything except the format box has a sensible default, so a plain numbering run is three clicks.
- Add the document using the box above. All pages start selected, which is what you want for a straightforward numbering run.
- Choose a position. Bottom centre is the usual choice for reports; bottom right suits anything bound on the left edge.
- Set the format. Leave it as {n} for a bare number, or use one of the presets, Page {n}, {n} / {total}, or - {n} - .
- Set the starting number if the count should not begin at 1, for example when a cover page is not counted.
- Adjust size, font and distance from the edge if the document already has a footer that the number would collide with.
- Deselect any pages that should not be numbered, then press Add page numbers and download the result.
Format Templates and Starting Numbers
The format box is a template rather than a fixed choice. Two placeholders are substituted: {n} becomes the page number and {total} becomes the number of pages in the document. Everything else in the box is printed literally, so Page {n} of {total} produces exactly that, and you can add a dash, a section prefix or brackets by typing them.
The starting number applies to the first page you selected, and the count runs upward from there through the selection in document order. That is how you handle a cover page that should not be numbered: deselect it, and page two of the file becomes number 1. It is also how a document that continues from another one gets numbers that carry on, by starting at 24 rather than 1. The preview line shows what the first numbered page will read before you commit.
Format Examples
Assuming a twelve-page document and a start number of 1, this is what each template produces.
| Template | First page | Third page | Common use |
|---|---|---|---|
| {n} | 1 | 3 | Clean, minimal documents |
| Page {n} | Page 1 | Page 3 | Reports and letters |
| {n} / {total} | 1 / 12 | 3 / 12 | Handouts, so nobody loses a page |
| Page {n} of {total} | Page 1 of 12 | Page 3 of 12 | Formal or legal documents |
| - {n} - | - 1 - | - 3 - | Books and typeset material |
| A-{n} | A-1 | A-3 | Appendices and numbered sections |
The built-in PDF fonts cover Latin characters only, so a template written in Korean, Chinese or Japanese cannot be stamped. The tool checks before it starts and says so rather than failing partway through.
Rotated Pages and Existing Footers
Scanned documents often carry a rotation, and a number drawn without accounting for it lands sideways in the margin. Here the position is calculated in the space you actually see, so a page rotated ninety degrees gets its number in the visible bottom corner, the right way up, no need to rotate the document first, though doing so makes the result easier to picture.
If the document already has a footer, the number can land on top of it. Increase the distance from the edge to push the number further in, or move it to a top position instead. Numbers are drawn over the page content, so they will always be visible rather than hidden behind a background.
Numbering Documents You Cannot Send Away
Page numbers are usually added at the end of a process, to a document that is finished and about to be sent somewhere official: a court bundle, a tender response, a set of financial statements, an application pack. By that stage the file contains everything it is ever going to contain, which is exactly the wrong moment to upload it to an unknown server.
Nothing is uploaded here. The document is read into your browser, the numbers are drawn locally with fonts already built into the PDF format, and the file is written back out in the same page. There is no account, no processing queue and no copy left behind.